Hey, stop me if you heard this one. CNN published a “news” story about school shootings, claiming that in the year since the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, there have been 31 school shootings in the United States, and it turns out that the story is a smelly turd filled with manipulated data and disinformation.

CNN claims that “by their count,” the 31 alleged school shootings that took place in the last year mean that there has been an incident in which someone was shot at a school roughly every 12 days.

By their count.

Turns out CNN’s count is about as accurate as a gun scene in a Transformers movie.

Dis my shock face, see?

See, to CNN, any incident involving anything that even resembles a firearm – be it a Pop-Tart chewed into a vague gun shape or a chicken tender – used against someone within throwing distance of a school is  considered a school shooting.

The parameters CNN followed in this count are:

Shooting must involve at least one person being shot (not including the shooter)

Shooting must occur on school property, which includes but is not limited to buildings, fields, parking lots, stadiums and buses

We included gang violence, fights and domestic violence, but our count is not limited to those categories

We included the accidental discharge of a firearm as long as the first two parameters are met — except when the sole shooter is a law enforcement or security officer

Note that the shooting doesn’t have to have happened in school and doesn’t have to have anything to do with school. As long as a discharge of a weapon happened – even accidentally (but not law enforcement, because only police and military should have guns, right?) – CNN now disingenuously considers it a “school shooting.”

How convenient.

But as you will see, CNN’s count smells like so much fetid garbage that’s been left out in the Florida heat.

A shooting at nearly 11pm in California last month that resulted in a 17-year-old football player’s death in the vicinity of an elementary school is a “school shooting” by CNN standards.

Another shooting in Nevada last September resulted in the death of a legal adult – an 18-year-old – in an event that police say may not have even had anything to do with the Canyon Springs High School is also apparently a school shooting by CNN’s count.

“It had nothing to do necessarily with Canyon Springs High School, other than that it was on the northwest property line, out west of the baseball fields,” NLVPD Chief Justin Roberts said.

The Skyline High School, Texas, incident in November resulted in one individual shot. It was Thanksgiving. Schools were closed, and the shooting turned out to be a drive-by that happened in the same neighborhood as the school. A shooting at Hebron High School in September in Texas was self defense, according to police. But apparently a citizen defending himself from an aggressor qualifies as a “school shooting” by CNN’s count.

Drive-by shootings after school hours, incidents not related to school in any way that took place in the proximity of a school, crimes of opportunity that have nothing to do with school, shootings in parking lots late at night, shootings on weekends, accidents, and acts far out of the realm of what law enforcement officers consider to be school shootings are also included, as are incidents that involve toys. Yes, toys.

The alleged victim told police the teen chased him and shot him with a BB pistol at the middle school; he suffered a minor injury of bruising and pain, according to police.

So when incidents involving toys, self defense, criminal activity unrelated to the school, but that took place near a school, after hours, or in a parking lot are removed, the number of school shootings in the year since the Parkland massacre is actually 14 – less than half what CNN claims, which translates to a school shooting every 26 days or so.

And while we don’t want to minimize the gravity of school shootings, manipulating statistics and news stories and trying to use disinformation to turn Americans against their natural rights is morally repugnant. If you can’t use truth to convince, apparently you need to simply manipulate data.

Is it any wonder CNN is considered fake news?

Nope, that’s not how any of this works.

Even NPR – not exactly a bastion of conservative thought – admits that school shootings are on the decline. But CNN and its drooling leftist minions have a pathological need to create a panic, manufacture crises, and impose their twisted agenda on the rest of us no matter what.

On this anniversary of a horrific school massacre, remember those who perished. Honor their memory by ensuring you always assert and treasure your right to keep and bear arms – your right to resist a tyrannical government – your right to defend what is precious to you from violence. Don’t cower in fear, and don’t bow to would-be dictators.

Work to preserve your rights.

Featured photo by Fabrice Florin licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license (cropped)